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Saturday, September 14, 2013

Channeling Jesse Helms

This should give you a nice little giggle:

”The willingness to say all those crazy things is a rare, rare
characteristic in this town, and you know what? It’s every bit as true
now as it was then. We need a hundred more like Jesse Helms in the U.S.
Senate.”

-Ted Cruz

Yes, he really said that.

Jesse Helms died five years ago. Do you remember him? You're forgiven if you do not. He was a North Carolinian senator for thirty years. But other than that, the only thing memorable about old Jesse is the fact that he was a racist demagogue of the worst order - a real mean spirited buffoon. As soon as he was in the ground he was quickly forgotten. In fact it had been quite some time since the old bastard even entered my mind until Ted Cruz mentioned him this week in a speech to the Heritage Foundation. It would seem that Jesse was a real inspiration to Ted. He says (or he claims - you need to take everything the Texas senator says with a ten pound bag of salt) that the very first political donation he ever made was ten dollars to a Jesse Helms campaign; this at a time when his allowance was fifty cents a week. How touching. Since Ted Cruz was born in 1970 we must assume that this political awakening must have taken place sometime in the eighties. Knowing the rates of inflation as I do, this begs the question: What the heck could one purchase with fifty cents by that time? He is either lying or Papa Cruz must be pretty tight with a dollar.

One thing that fills me with inconsolable grief is that Jesse Helms did not live to see the inauguration of the current chief-executive. Barack Obama had not yet won the Democratic nomination by the time Jesse bought the farm on the fourth of July 2008. I imagine the very sight of a black guy taking the oath of office would have given Jesse a fatal case of spastic apoplexy. I can just picture the old son-of-a-bitch confronted with the vision of President Obama giving his inaugural address. There is Jesse curled up in a fetal position, banging his head against the floor, gagging on his own vomit. That would have been a lovely thing to behold.

Carol Moseley Braun

Here's a little example of just what a class act Jesse Helms was: CarolMoseley Braun of Chicago served one term in the senate between the years 1993 and 1999. She was only the second African American in history ever elected to that body. One day she was riding up in the senate elevator with Helms and Orin Hatch. Jessie looked at Orin and said, "I'm gonna make this girl cry!" He then put his face up to her's and started singing "Dixie". The man was a walking, talking piece-of-shit.

To the day of his death, Jesse Helms was a proud, unabashed and unapologetic racist and segregationist. Although he has yet to make the admission, Ted Cruz must be one as well. Why else would he come right out and say what he did this week about the life and legacy of Senator Helms?

Decent people are trying to forget that a disgusting bigot like Jesse Helms ever desecrated the floors of our nation's capitol. His career as a legislator is not unlike the tenure of a priest who for four years was the pastor of the Catholic church in my home town. For the entire time he was there "Father Ed" was molesting teenage boys. People are trying to forget about him, too.

Teddy Boy

IT'S ALIVE!!!

Ted Cruz is another story. We just can't put him out of our minds. The people of Texas (being the people of Texas) were foolish enough to send this bloviating gasbag to Washington as their representative. We can't merely dismiss him out of hand. He's here legislating and agitating and he's not going away any time soon - which is fine 'n' dandy for my purposes. You see, for those of us who make our reputations by commenting on the train-wreck that American politics has become in the last thirty years, Ted Cruz is the gift that keeps giving and giving and giving; the guy is simply fantastic copy. When your vocation is to make observations regarding a bus full of clowns, people like Ted and his compatriots in lunacy make the job fairly easy. I'll be blunt with you: These things write themselves. Seriously. The unintentional comedy of these unintentional comedians makes one dread the day that they're gone forever - and that day will be here sooner than you think.

A lot is made of the notion that Ted is a smart gent - why, he graduated from Harvard for Pete's sake! Really? Some of the most reprehensible dingbats in American history were Harvard alumni. If there exists a more overrated institution of higher learning than Harvard I'd really like to know about it. I knew many people - a hell-of-a-lot smarter than Ted Cruz - when I attended Orange County Community College back in the seventies. Please.

It is now obvious that the Canadian-born Cruz wants to take his weird act nationwide. He's planning on throwing his tinfoil-hat into the ring. It will probably be at least another two years before it's official, but Teddy Boy is planning on becoming president on January 20, 2017.

Oh, thank you, fate.

This what I'm talking about when I speak of the gifts generously given by the unintentional comedians. The Cruz for Prez spectacle is almost three years away, which seems like a lifetime-and-a-half from this vantage point. This is something I'm so looking forward to that I can't even put the anticipation into words. The primaries themselves are going to be a riot of mirth and merriment. You thought 2012 was a hoot? OH, BROTHER! With Teddy Boy in the running, 2016 will make last year's contest (as funny as thatone was) look like the scene from Gone With the Wind when Bonnie Blue Butler falls off the pony and dies. This is going to be beautiful!

It will be particularly gratifying when "birtherism" comes back to haunt the Tea partiers who are just wild for their man Ted. As I mentioned before, unlike Barack Obama (who was born in the USA) Ted Cruz really is foreign-born. How will the right-wing crazies be able to rationalize his candidacy? They'll find a way, I'm sure. They always do. Have you ever noticed that?

So let us here and now raise our glasses in a toast to Ted and Jesse, two political ships that never had the joy of passing each other in the American night. It's almost comforting to know that Cruz is on hand to pick up Helms' torch of idiocy and ignorance. Ted Cruz is the rightful, political heir of Jesse Helms. He is in politics to advance Jesse's cause. He's proud of that fact. It kinda makes you wonder, huh? It really does!

Somewhere, Jesse must be smiling wide. You can't blame him either. I wonder if they serve lollipops where he is? Tom DeganGoshen, NY

SUGGESTED VIEWING:

Here's Rachel Maddow's comment on Ted Cruz's hero worship of Jesse Helms. As is her habit, she's right on target:

Last October 14 I made mention on this site of the death of Jerry Degan, my late father's last surviving brother. A few days ago I received a phone call from my sister informing me of the passing of Grace, Jerry's beloved wife of sixty-two years.

Tell
me the truth, family: Did you ever know another human being in your entire life
who was more aptly named than Aunt Grace? She was the sweetest, loveliest
person I think any of us ever knew. I'm gonna miss that infectious laugh
- AND THAT SMILE??? - you could read at midnight by it. Grace Degan was ninety-one when she left us on September 6, 2013 - a pretty good run any way you slice it or dice it.

For every one that goes before me I fear it less and less. You do, too. C'mon, admit it!

36 Comments:

We need to character assasinate Ted Cruz since he could swing latinos who are multiplying like rabbits. My mentor was Saul Alinsky and thats what we progressives do best.

I talked a real big game about "Who do you trust with the 3AM phone call", but folded like a cheap suitcase the night of Libya attacks.

We need progressives to show up at Ted's rallies carrying a poster of Obama with a bone in his nose like Dave Dubya does at Tea Party Rallies. The means justify the ends as discussed in the second chapter of Saul's wonderful book, Rules for Radicals.

Tom, in as much as Cruz is pissing of some of the GOP as well as the liberals, I have a strong feeling that he will crash and burn before the election. These "rising stars" of the GOP have short life times. Don't forget that Marco Rubio was the hot young thing for a while and he now seems to have gotten his fingers scorched.

RFK Jr. also kept notes for his journal during his month-long stint in a Puerto Rican prison that July. He, the Rev. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson’s wife, Jacqueline, were charged with trespassing during protests on Vieques, the Puerto Rican island the US Navy used as a bombing range.

The Revs. Jackson and Sharpton “give me the creeps,” Kennedy writes in a July 5 entry.

“Al Sharpton has done more damage to the black cause than [segregationist Alabama Gov.] George Wallace. He has suffocated the decent black leaders in New York,” he says. “His transparent venal blackmail and extortion schemes taint all black leadership.”

Rev. Al Sharpton gave Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “the creeps,” he wrote in his diary.

He goes on to call Sharpton a “buffoon” who has never escaped the “stench” of his advocacy for Tawana Brawley, the black Dutchess County teen who fabricated a story about six white men raping her in 1987.

Until Ted Cruz can prove his natural parents were married legally to each other at the time of his birth in Alberta Canada, he remains solely a Canadian citizen. His mom, an American if not married legally at the time to Rafael Sr. may not have been a resident of he U.S. for 12 previous months which was the law at the time of his birth in 1970. That Canadian birth certificate published by his friends in a Dallas Newspaper don't mean Jack without the other supportive marriage certificates. It does not end with the Canadian Birth Certificate but opens up other real questions about his right to even be in the United States Senate.

An attacker pummeled a bus passenger so hard he smashed the bones in his face after calling the victim a “cracker” in Manhattan – marking the second time in two days that people appeared to be randomly targeted in racial tirades against white people, authorities said.

In the latest incident, the suspect passed a 31-year-old rider on the M60 bus riding through Harlem, on West 127th Street, between Amsterdam Avenue and Morningside Drive, around 2:45 p.m., Friday, when he shouted the racial slur and punched the victim in the face, breaking his nose and eye socket, cops said.Modal Trigger

The alleged M60 bus attacker

The victim was treated for facial fractures at New York Presbyterian Hospital and released, police said.

The incident occurred as authorities reported that Jeffrey Babbitt, 62, fell into a coma after being punched and knocked to the ground in Union Square Park on Wednesday. He was taken off life support and died Monday, sources said.

I love how conservative BIGOTS keep bringing up "Black on White" crimes as if they are the same kind of case as Zimmerman/Martin. Since in ALL the cases cited the perps were arrested, jailed, and convicted (or soon will be convicted) they are NOT the same at all. Zimmerman was not charged or held for any crime until public outcry forced the police to do sokething. Then he got a mock trial wand was released.

Why do you suppose ass-clowns like Cruz are so popular? Less and less do I see Republicans make a convincing argument about anything! They have no ideas! They have no plans! All they do is piss and moan and people send them to Congress.

It's amazing.

So why Tom why? Do we actually have this many people in the country who are pissed at a black man in the White House?

Is it massive stupidity that was previously unknown?

Is the Tea Party a mechanism were every moron can participate and feel "informed?"

Has years of the likes of Limbaugh & Co eroded the common fucking sense from our fellow citizens?

What is it?!?

When you do have a GOPer who offers a twist on an "Obama Idea" or finds some common ground or who doesn't want to obstruct; they're immediately labeled a RINO and primaried.

The New York City Police Department’s (NYPD) Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating a savage attack that took place Wednesday afternoon in Union Square, after witnesses say a man vowed to attack white people before assaulting multiple individuals and leaving one man brain dead.

The black suspect, Lashawn Marten, 31, was playing chess before randomly jumping up and declaring “I hate white people,” according to one witness.

Another eye-witness told WLNY-TV that Marten said “the next white person who walks by I’m going to f**k.”

Marten’s fists then started to fly, allegedly targeting random white individuals as they walked by.

“His fist went in and the man’s head bobbed and he hit the ground and you could hear his skull hitting the ground,” the unidentified witness added.

That man, Jeffrey Babbitt, 62, has now been declared clinically brain dead. In a video posted to video-sharing website Instagram, Babbitt can be seen on the ground with blood flowing from his head.

Forbes cites a new survey of federal workers that reveals over 92% of them think they should be allowed to keep their current health care plans, instead of being forced into ObamaCare. Less than 3% of them are eager to jump aboard the train-wreck ObamaCare exchanges that so many private workers are being forced into. Also, 96% of them want federal retirees to keep their current insurance programs, instead of Medicare.

Of course, as the Forbes piece notes, these people belong to unions that were instrumental in giving Barack Obama the political support he needed to force his lousy health-care scheme on the rest of us. And Congress is getting that sweet, sweet taxpayer subsidy it technically doesn’t qualify for, forcing the taxpayer to pick up costs for representatives and staffers that private-sector employees have to pay out of their own pockets.

Most of America’s media think President Obama's 2009 bailout of General Motors and Chrysler was a huge success.

Former Massachusetts Democratic Congressman Barney Frank threw cold water on this meme on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday correctly informing viewers that the auto bailout lost money for the federal government. By contrast, we made money from George W. Bush's 2008 bank bailout.

BARNEY FRANK, FORMER CONGRESSMAN (D-MASSACHUSETTS): First of all, many of the banks didn't want this money. It’s not that we did it for them. But secondly, the federal government made money on the advances to the banks. What cost us money was the automobile industry bailout. But we made money on the banks.

HENRY PAULSON, FORMER BUSH TREASURY SECRETARY: We got all the money back plus $32 billion.

Indeed. Meanwhile, the government’s investment in General Motors stock is still underwater.

Yet to liberal media members, Obama’s auto bailout along with his stimulus package are responsible for the economic recovery.

That might be convenient for the ego of the current White House resident, but honest economists in the future will likely credit Bush’s Troubled Asset Relief Program in October 2008 as being what saved us and the world from a far worse financial industry collapse paving the way for an expansion albeit a weak one.

What economically ignorant media members ignore is that the 2008 financial crisis was not economic. It was a banking and insurance company collapse.

Once the banks and insurance companies were shored up by TARP, the economy was positioned to recover with or without the auto bailout and the stimulus.

With that in mind, it sure was nice to see a Democrat admit that the government lost on the auto bailout but profited from TARP.

And we see it’s once again time for “copy and paste plagiarizing of Right Wing media”, trolling at its lamest. Gotta get those GOP talking points out, yessiree. Don’t even have to think. No problem there.

Most of America’s media think President Obama's 2009 bailout of General Motors and Chrysler was a huge success.

And they would be right. (Although never mind Bush started the bailouts.) Only the “Death panel” Fringe Kooks believe otherwise.

For the trolls of the fringe cult, a million and a half Americans out of jobs and stripped of pensions would be a success.

No wonder most Americans don’t drink their koolade. Most Americans aren’t so indoctrinated and frightened into believing Liberals are destroying America. Most Americans are waking up to who really runs the show.

Money talks, Democracy walks.

And “we” didn’t make money on the bank bailouts. THE BANKS DID.

Are they that stupid?....

WE LOST MONEY. We lost home values. We lost pensions and 401(k)’s.

Clueless twits just don’t get it.

Recovery for the Rich, recession for the rest, is what’s going on if front of their noses and they can’t see it.

And they want to reward the rich even more as they punish the rest of us. Everything in the Right’s agenda is identical to the agenda of the greediest and most corrupt of our society.

Ask one where his beliefs differ from that agenda.

You won’t get an answer.

You’ll get more copy and past, lies, evasions, and, of course, accusations.

All I can say Dave is to blame Barney, he's the one who said, "the federal government made money on the advances to the banks. What cost us money was the automobile industry bailout. But we made money on the banks", on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday.

And be sure to blame Forbes who cited a new survey of federal workers that revealed over 92% of them think they should be allowed to keep their current health care plans, instead of being forced into ObamaCare. Federal Workers Dave, your kind of people. Where the real job growth under Obama has taken place. Gov workers whose earnings comes from the tax payers, not from the production of a product or service as in the private sector.

I guess this put's an end to your claims of a troll plagiarizing, the sources were noted if you would take a minute to read and think! Huh sport?

Remember all, the quote was from former Congressman (D) Barney Frank, a well known member of the "Right Wing media". As long as you want to believe Dave over Barney Frank be my quest, the Kool Aid stand is over there on the Far Left! Next to the Loss of Reality Fair entrance. Admission is free, of course. But it costs you every thing to get out.

Anyway, you just focus on the awfulness of Senator Cruz, that will not prevent the truth from getting out for all to read and expose what you can not stand to be exposed. Prove Barney wrong Dave, if you can. Prove Barney a liar, Dave if you can.You can take that to the bank!

Anonymous"Forbes cites a new survey of federal workers that reveals over 92% of them think they should be allowed to keep their current health care plans, instead of being forced into ObamaCare."And do you blame Chuck Grassley? You should. It was his amendment. Don't worry, it wasn't offered in good faith; it was made so that the Right would have the "government workers forced in to Obamacare!" (which isn't what the ACA is for, as government workers already had employer-based health insurance, but we don't want to muddy the conversation with facts).

"Less than 3% of them are eager to jump aboard the train-wreck ObamaCare exchanges that so many private workers are being forced into.""Train-wreck"? It depends on the state. From non-creation of state exchanges to not funding informing people about the facts of the ACA at both the federal and state level (because, and I know you're going to be shocked by this, people don't know much and most of what they do know is wrong) to refusing to fix the issues that inevitably crop up, like religious group insurance, to actively encouraging people not to get insurance.Meanwhile California and New York, the latter of which had Universal Coverage but no Universal Mandate (making for high premiums), are doing better.Weird how places that want things to work work better than places that don't, eh?

Most importantly, will any of this change or effect your view in any way? Taking in to account past history, no.

I guess this put's an end to your claims of a troll plagiarizing, the sources were noted

I guess the following makes the preceding a lie.

Most of America’s media think President Obama's 2009 bailout of General Motors and Chrysler was a huge success.

Former Massachusetts Democratic Congressman Barney Frank threw cold water on this meme on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday correctly informing viewers that the auto bailout lost money for the federal government. By contrast, we made money from George W. Bush's 2008 bank bailout.

Copy and pasted from the radical Right Wing Newsbusters ...and not credited, huh, sport?

"We" made money? Go ahead and believe Barney Frank. It's a lovely picture. Good to see you're obsessed with another man besides me.

Bill Clinton bears as much responsibility as any politician for the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, and the wild applause for his disingenuous speech at the Democratic National Convention last week is a sure sign of the poverty of what passes for progressive politics.

Do those convention delegates, and the fawning media that were wowed by the former president’s rhetorical seductions, not recall that just before he left office Clinton signed off on the game-changing legislation that ended the sensible rules imposed on Wall Street during the Great Depression? It was Clinton who cooperated with the Republicans in reversing the legacy of FDR’s New Deal, opening the floodgates of unfettered avarice that almost drowned the world’s economy during the reign of George W. Bush.

How convenient to ignore the Financial Services Modernization Act, which Clinton signed into law to summarily end the Glass-Steagall barrier against the commingling of investment and commercial banking. Do the Democrats not remember that Citigroup, the first too-big-to-fail bank made legal by the law Clinton signed, became the $15 million employer of Robert Rubin, the Clinton treasury secretary who led the fight for the law that legalized the creation of Citigroup? Or that Citigroup—led by Sanford Weill, to whom Clinton gave one of the souvenir pens he used to approve that onerous legislation—went on to be a major player in the subprime mortgage swindles and had to be bailed out with more than $50 billion of taxpayer funds?

Harry, now you're just being ridiculous. Everybody knows that the mortgage bubble was caused by the CRA and sneaky minorities.

Why, if it was a political problem (and a Republican-leaning, but bipartisan one at that) the Republicans would be rushing to repeal the Financial Services Modernization Act, bring back Glass-Steagal and regulate things like derivatives, forcing them to be traded with relative transparently like stocks instead of virtual opacity, instead of obstructing the mushy, feckless reform of Dodd-Frank (staying in only to weaken and poison it, voting against it en masse at the end anyway), and voting for the Ryan plan (among other things) guts oversight of the financial sector.

In closing, since it's Clinton's fault, none of what happened above could have possibly happened. Further, the mid to late 1990s weren't an orgy of go-go-go Free Market "they're self-regulating" rah-rah-rahism, and I also did not wear parachute pants.

Barney Frank said we (the U.S.Federal Govt) made money on the banks who repaid the U.S.Federal Govt loans.

Barney Frank said the Federal Govt lost not been paid back the loans given to the US auto makers.

Barney Frank said these things on NBC T.V. program called "Meet the Press."

Transcripts are available at NBC.com

I thought the Federal Govt was the people, after all the money the Federal Govt made off of the Banks was money that we the people didn't have to pay back in taxes like we are having to do the loans given to the auto makers.

Hasn't it been claimed that one of the reasons for not having Federal tax cuts is the Federal Govt cant afford them? Like it's their money, not ours? So doesn't it reason if that is fact that when the Federal Govt makes MONEY, WE all make money and when the Federal Govt loses money, WE all lose money, and when the Federal Govt SPENDS money, we are also spending money?

Got a ? for you Dave, what happened between your post at 12:46 PM and 1:18 PM?

As for "Recovery for the rich. Recession for the rest", not according to the President speech today. And interestingly enough didn't B. Frank said on Meet the Press (transcripts can be found at NBC.COM) that Presidents TARP plan save the county's economy from collapse? And that the money TARP gave to the Banks has been paid back with a profit? And that is Bush's fault? Wow, some faint praise! Or is B. Frank a lying?

“If this goes into effect on January 1, we will never, ever, ever get rid of it,” Cruz told the audience of the Laura Ingraham radio show. “We either do it now or we surrender entirely,” he warned on Sean Hannity’s program.

Why will it become impossible to stop Obamacare after January 1? That’s when Americans will become “hooked on the subsidies, addicted to the sugar,” Cruz told a Tea Party gathering in his home state on August 19, according to the Texas Tribune. “If we get to January 1, this thing is here forever.”

Fuk you Cruz. I don't want to work and want as much free stuff from Obama and the Democratic Plantation as I can get!